Thoughts
When I think of Belgium, three things come to my mind: beer, waffles, and chocolate.
With a bit of time between my culinary school classes, I decided to take a train from Paris up to Brussels to explore the food scene (but mainly the beer scene.) It’s only a two hour train from Paris, and another two hours from Amsterdam, which makes it an easy place to stop by and see within a larger Europe trip.
Broadly speaking, I felt that Brussels is a bit run down. Beyond lacking the “magic” of lots of European cities,1 a lot of buildings are boarded up, even in very touristy and commercial areas. In general, this made it feel like there was far less to do, despite walking around a lot of the city.
The food scene in Brussels wasn’t glamorous; most things that I tried didn’t wow me. What is known internationally as a Belgium waffle, I found to be just okay; Liege2 waffles were much better. The breweries in the city were also just okay, but I somewhat expected that. Any large operation (and thus popular) would be too big to fit in the city-center. That said, I still would recommend several breweries and bars in the city.
Reviews
Next time
While I didn’t have much time in Brussels, I felt that I saw most of what I would want to see. The next time I’m in Belgium, I hope to explore less of the cities; a lot of my favorite beers are made in the countryside, often even at monasteries. I especially want to tour Espace Chimay (Chimay) and Brasserie d’Achouffe (Chouffe) and try the beer directly from their breweries.
